IN-DEPTH FEATURESThe Dovrat Report about the State of Israel's Education
System

By T. Katz

A commission was appointed to study and make
recommendations for Israeli education: Why its report has
aroused tremendous passions, both pro and con.

The company is not profitable and has even been suffering
losses? The enterprise has not proven itself? The business is
failing and the future looks bleak? Management knows just
what to do: sentiment gets tossed out the window and the
accounting books get cracked open for thorough review. Cuts
are made mercilessly. Workers are fired after 40 years of
company loyalty. The manager who gave up his evenings,
vacations and holidays for the sake of the factory is called
in for a talk and told to clear out his desk. Production is
transferred to Jordan and efforts are made to forget how,
once upon a time before the demise of principle, it was
important to make it possible for Jews to earn a living.

At the end of the day, the efficient decision-maker lets out
a sigh of relief and makes a checkmark beside the stated
goal. The factory will be profitable—perhaps over the
dead bodies of 20 or 30 people, but there is no alternative.
In business there is no room for feelings and friendship.

This approach, which is definitely effective in
rehabilitating failing businesses, is spreading like wildfire
in fields far from the world of business. Netanyahu and his
ministry officials declared war long ago on the weak and the
unprofitable. In this spirit of Thatcherism, the Dovrat
Committee, as well, have decided to manage education like a
business enterprise.

Student Plus Grade Equals Output

The catalyst for the new initiatives were several humiliating
blows to the Israeli educational system. The Israeli student
brought home shameful marks on international tests,
humiliating the country in front of dozens of foreign
nations. But we will not forgive and forget. He will yet
bring us pride. He will prove that Jewish brains are a fact;
he will demonstrate that the Nobel Prize to Chiechanover
(Aaron Chiechanover who won the prize in Chemistry last year)
was not a fluke; he will not fail mathematics again!

The Dovrat Committee, headed by businessman Shlomo Dovrat,
wants demonstrable results. It expects to rake in "profits"
from the student. If the student yields dividends by
succeeding on math exams he will have earned his keep. If the
teacher does not cost the system too much he will be
permitted to remain. The Dovrat Committee offers no solution
for the crisis in values. It contains no novel ideas on how
to reduce the growing violence in schools.

What does it contain?

"When the school atmosphere changes," explains Dovrat, "when
the recommended organizational changes are made, the level of
violence will be lowered automatically."

The economic spirit behind the committee's decisions would
lead one to believe that when the student comes to realize
the teacher is not worth a measly NIS 4,000 per month but NIS
6,000 or more, he will conclude that it is not right to stand
on the third floor and drop a bag filled with water on his
head or to hurl orange peels at him. Respect for money is the
only value that remains among violent Israeli students.

It would be unforgivable if we failed to mention the never-
ending drive to brand the values of nation-building into the
student's ethos. According to the National Task Force, the
student, "must be a person who loves humanity, a person who
loves his people and his land, a citizen loyal to the State
of Israel, honoring his parents and family, knowing his
language, his heritage and his cultural identity and
respecting them."

According to the committee, "In order to reach these goals
the public education systems must inculcate its students with
the values of the State of Israel [take a deep breath] as a
Jewish, democratic state, and develop in them a sense of
respect for human rights, fundamental liberties, democratic
values, abiding by the law, the culture and worldview of
others, striving to educate toward peace and tolerance among
people and nations."

We pored over the report, searching for the plan that is
supposed to transform the Israeli student from a vandal to a
lover of humanity, from an inarticulate student "burned out"
as a teenager to one who "knows his language" and "his
cultural identify." We searched and searched, but were unable
to find even a brief paragraph dedicated to "striving to
educate toward peace and tolerance among people and nations."
As we will see below, the Dovrat Report is splendidly
written, exhibiting strength in its stream of mumbo-jumbo but
not backed by the slightest indication of how to implement
it.

*

The final draft of the Dovrat Report was submitted to the
government early last week. The central conclusions are
astounding in the aestheticism of the goals and the
impressive linguistic acrobatics, with their astonishing gap
between the goals and any implementation.

Dr. Mark, an expert on educational economics at the
University of Tel Aviv, told Yated Ne'eman, "The
Dovrat Report is an amazing contradiction between defining
goals and realizing them in practice."

If Everything is So Good, How Could it be So
Bad?

The goals of the Dovrat Report are universally accepted by a
consensus representing every age and population sector. You
will not find a single Israeli who argues, opposes or objects
to implementing them with all his heart. Everyone agrees that
the educational system has turned into a chronically-ill
patient. The debate in the latter pages of the report is over
the proposed solutions.

What is the Dovrat vision?

First and foremost "full responsibility for tapping the
potential of every student." Finally they get it! I always
said my child was a potential Einstein. Now these people,
too, realize the problem is the teachers who failed to tap my
little Chaim's potential. And what will become of the
neighbor's son, who can't understand a single word? He's a
human being, too. The Dovrat Report leaves nobody out:
"Constant nurturing of the weak students."

Turning the page we find more promises. "The educational
system must reduce gaps stemming from the students'
socioeconomic background, their social background [i.e.
Sephardic, Ashkenazi, etc.] or their place of residence . .
."

Nu, who does not want to reduce gaps? The majority of Israeli
citizens, at least those who do not live in Kfar Shmarayahu,
would like to see the level of study in every part of the
country, including Dimona and Jaljulya, comparable to the
standards in Herzliya and the like.

Later: "Significant improvement in the teaching profession
and its status in order to transform teaching into a high-
caliber, prestigious, sought-after profession. Greater
demands will be placed on teachers and the authorities, and
responsibilities imposed on them will be increased. The
quality of their training will be raised, their hours will be
increased and their pay will be substantially improved."

The parents of every student in Israel would back this
principle. Who is not in favor of raising the level of
instruction? What parent has not bemoaned the decline in
teaching? And if teachers' salaries increase, my child only
stands to gain.

Let's carry on. "Fortifying the status and independence of
the school: The school and kindergarten are the center of
educational endeavor. They will be given full responsibility,
authority and autonomy in the fields of pedagogy, budgeting
and organization. The school day will be lengthened and
during the course of the day a range of educational
activities will be held for the students and the community."
The long school day is the dream of hundreds of thousands of
parents, who would also be very pleased to see the school
receive full funding autonomy. When offered eight hours a day
of varied educational activities, who could refuse?

Our spirits rise from one moment to the next, particularly
when we consider the high-school girl sitting in a class of
48 students as is typical in many Bais Yaakov schools. "Up to
35 students per classroom: According to the recommendation,
every effort should be made to ensure that no more than 35
students study together in one class. The differential budget
granted to schools with students from a low socioeconomic
background will allow instruction in small study groups to
boost students who encounter difficulties."

As we read the following lines our hearts fill with joy.
"Public school from the age of three: Every child will be
able to study at a public kindergarten starting from the age
of three due to the great importance that the Task Force
attributes to increasing every child's chances in the early
years of his life." Dovrat rattles on profusely about
dropping out of school, values and everything else under the
sun.

After perusing the goals we all feel a part of the National
Task Force; all of us are Dovrat. But before getting carried
away, we should read a few words about how this is to be
executed.

To address this question, 17 experts were brought into the
National Task Force to build an organizational reform for the
educational system. This reform sets many on fire and major
wars are likely to break out. Here lies the heart of the
matter. "Organizational change," says Dr. Mark, "cannot
improve the quality of education [by itself]. There are
factors far more important than the size of the school and
various and strange structural changes."

The Grade Industry

What is Dovrat proposing? First and foremost the Core
Curriculum Program. All schools from every sector will be
required to teach a program based on the Core subjects, which
include Hebrew, English, Arabic, math, universal fundamentals
of civics — and Tanach in Hebrew-speaking
schools.

The cardinal paragraph deals with the reorganization of the
education system and the decentralization of responsibility.
The Education Ministry is booted off to the side and for the
most part it will be taken out of the picture.

Who will be left in charge of the schools? Meet the District
Education Administration.

"The District Education Administration's professional,
management and budgeting independence will be guaranteed.
Every District Education Administration will operate as a
closed financial administration and its resources will not be
available for any other purpose. A District Education Council
will be set up at every District Education Administration,
headed by the heads of the local authorities and comprised of
education professionals and community representatives. Among
its tasks will be to approve policy decisions and long-range
plans."

The District Education Administration's powers are unlimited.
"The District Education Administration is responsible for
comprehensive administration of all of the pedagogical,
physical and administrative aspects of every educational
institution in its jurisdiction, including informal education
systems. School principals will be administratively
subordinate to a single entity, the District Education
Administration, whose tasks will include supervision, control
and assessment of processes and the output of every
school."

Listen carefully. The new organization, the District
Education Administration, will be under the local authority.
Why didn't we think of such a bright idea? An emblem of
national efficiency, a marvel of administrative prowess and a
wondrous example of the high-caliber public body totally free
of waste, an administrative staff of rare
professionalism— indeed, the local authority is the
worthy choice to run education. The small-time politicians
brimming with wily interests will be the ones to take up the
reins of school administration.

And what will be if the education system comes to resemble
the local authorities running it? What will be when it begins
to reflect the deficit-ridden body that cannot pay wages for
two years' time? Then we will find the previous education
system had not hit rock bottom after all. There was still
room for further decline.

What will happen when the local authority finds itself in a
real mess?

It's easy enough to imagine the chaos that will reign in the
Arab sector. The head of the local clan will decide the size
of the teaching staff and his lackeys and cousins will
replace the teachers at will. The head of the local
authority, who will work according to regulations and will
not succumb to pressure, will suddenly find himself needing
four bodyguards to protect him.

At Jewish local councils, as well, the kinds not located
between Hadera and Gedera and where the local parents are
less intimidating—there too total chaos can be
expected, as jobs are handed out based on the familiar you-
save-me-a-spot- for-a-cleaning-worker-at-the-local-council-
and-I'll-save-you- a-spot-for-a-10th-grade-physics-teacher
formula.

One little question: What will the Education Ministry do with
all its free time? Dovrat places quite a hefty burden on the
Education Ministry clerks: "Its primary tasks will be
determining policy, long-term planning, setting goals,
budgeting, formulating the Core Curriculum program and
defining standards, supervision and control of the execution
of the policy and meeting the standards set, developing study
programs, arranging plans, drawing conclusions and promoting
programs in the national agenda."

Who would turn down a job like that? What a beautiful
description of a job with no work. Tomorrow morning try
telling the boss about the new job in the office. "I'm no
longer a bookkeeper. It's a poor use of time and it's a shame
to waste my talents on a job with such limited horizons. From
now on I am in charge of determining policy, arranging
programs, defining standards, long-term planning, handling
supervision and control and most of all I will draw and draw -
- twenty-four hours a day — I intend to draw
conclusions."

The school will become an autonomous unit and the principal,
at the top of the pyramid, will have greatly expanded powers.
"Focusing authority and responsibility for educational
endeavor at the school, places tremendous responsibility on
the school principal, who will be the leader of the school
apparatus. The principals' professionalism and status should
be reinforced by training them to bear the expanded
responsibility and their new tasks, and their salaries should
be raised to reflect this responsibility and this will draw
high-caliber forces to the profession."

And most of all: "The majority of the authority in the field
of pedagogy, the funding and the operation of the personnel
will be transferred to the schools and kindergarten clusters
to be started. Principals will be required to run the
educational institutions based on results-oriented
management. Principals will be able to select employees and
grant them flexibility by making use of the funding."

One small example of the principals' authorities is funding.
"Funding, in all phases of education, will be monetary. At
the disposal of every kindergarten cluster or school will be
a sum of money equivalent to the amount of funding earmarked
for it according to the various funding scales in the form of
a single, universal sum. The principal can use it based on
his own judgment, subject to the obligation to meet the wage
agreements, with a committed policy and tasks set for the
institution according to the guidelines set." The
transformation of the principal into a hybrid dictator,
industrial manager, budget setter and an object of
obsequiousness will be discussed below.

The size of schools will change. At primary schools 250-600
students will be enrolled and no high school will exceed
1,000 students. "Schools smaller than the minimum will be
combined," reads the report. "Schools larger than the maximum
will be divided into two separate schools operating at a
single facility. No primary school with fewer than 250
students will be opened.

The Dovrat Committee has determined that the division of
studies into three periods—primary school, middle
school and high school—causes difficulties for
students. Therefore it recommends that students transfer only
once during the course of their studies—from primary
school to high school. Middle schools will be eliminated and
every district education authority will be able to decide at
what grade level students will make the change to high
school.

What else? The task force is currently handling teachers'
salaries and promotion. Many education experts claim that the
caliber of teachers in Israel is very low. Many of them
simply have to be discarded. That teachers' wages in Israel
are disgraceful and far below international standards is
undisputed. The Dovrat Committee tries to address this issue.
Raising teachers' wages is desirable and constructive but the
means and a portion of the terms are simply unfeasible.

"Teachers bear the brunt of responsibility for the work of
education. In order to improve and advance the education
system significantly, the demands placed upon them and the
abilities of those pursuing the teaching profession should be
raised. Along with improving their training they should be
granted suitable terms for their work, giving them the needed
assistance for their professional development and
compensating them fairly.

"Teaching jobs will be at least eight hours per day, five
days a week. During the course of a week's work the teacher
will have 23-28 hours of classroom hours and the remaining
time he will engage in one-on-one teaching, carry out various
tasks at the school and perform other professional duties.

"Teachers' salaries will be comparable to that of civil
servants with college degrees in accordance with their work,
and promotion tracks will be available to reward professional
advancement and achievement. Tenure will continue to be a
component in salary determination but its weight will be
significantly less than its current weight and will peak
after 10-15 years. Emphasis will be placed on significant
wages for teachers at the beginning of their careers."

Some teachers will be worth more, some less. "Terms of
employment and teachers' salaries will be set through
collective agreements. Special contracts will be allowed in
special cases, which will be a small portion of all school
teachers. At a later time the task force will assess ways to
reward teachers or groups of teachers for excellence and to
integrate excellence as a salary component."

Teacher training will be held after an interim period, but
only at institutions recognized by the Council for Higher
Education and authorized to award BA and BS degrees and
teaching certificates. The entrance requirements for teacher
training will be raised.

The Dovrat Committee, as befits a committee operating in
Israel's achievement-oriented economic climate, uses the
following words to describe its primary aim: "Goal-oriented
education guided by results, based on an understanding that
the quality of the process and its output is no less
important than the amount of resources and outlays invested,
can and must direct and run the educational process to direct
it toward achieving goals and defined results. It is
important to translate the vision and goals of education into
clear priorities, quantifiable goals and long-term
planning."

Did you read that paragraph three times and still cannot
understand how the words fit together? We'll simplify the
matter by speaking in terms of production lines. What does
management do when a product is not lucrative enough? The
production process and raw materials are analyzed and
constant testing is performed in an effort to pinpoint the
problem. The Dovrat Committee sees grades and achievements as
a product, demands output from every student and therefore it
suggests constant assessment.

Here's another little quote: "Gauging and assessment, taking
responsibility and full disclosure of assessment and
measuring will become part of the culture of administration
throughout the system. Outside intervention in schools will
be replaced by gauging and assessment as an administrative
tool to serve the schools, both the district education
administrations and the Education Ministry and the general
public. An independent statutory unit will be set up, the
National Authority for Measuring and Assessment, which will
be the leading institution and the professional guide of the
education system in the fields of measurement and
assessment."

This should not be misunderstood. The education system must
have something to show for itself. Studies are naturally
achievement-oriented, which is what led to the concept of
grades, certificates and degrees. But the Dovrat Committee
places achievement at the top of the ladder of aspirations.
Therefore the first national achievement exam will be already
held in second grade. This is also the reason why
considerable weight will be given to subjects held in high
esteem around the world and in which exams are held
everywhere, most notably mathematics, of course. In the early
years of schooling emphasis will be placed on language
studies, math and computer skills.

"A full school day should be introduced throughout the
country at every school and kindergarten, from the age of 3
to 18," the Dovrat Committee recommends. "All kindergartens
and schools will operate five days a week from 8:00 a.m. to
4:00 p.m. The teachers will remain at the school throughout
the day and in addition to teaching will engage in tutoring
and other professional activities."

The school year will be divided into two semesters. At all
schools, classes will be held from the beginning of the
school year to the end, including 11th and 12th grades. The
summer break will be shortened by starting the school year on
August 20 and moving the missing vacation time to the winter.
Yossi Wasserman, secretary of the National Teachers'
Organization, says the Chanukah Break will be replaced by the
"January Break," which would allow Be'er Sheva students to go
on ski trips in the Negev. No mention has been made of how
the hot summer days will look in classrooms without air-
conditioners (which are not funded in the Dovrat Report).
Neither is any mention made of how parents will keep their
children occupied during the "January Break."

"Something Cold and Detached About It"

What do those in the know have to say about the Dovrat
Report?

First let's hear from the spokesmen for the children, the
Council for Child Welfare. "A shake-up is good for every
system, but it must be a shake-up that stirs new thinking and
not a shake-up that will bring down the boat with all its
passengers," says Council Chairman Dr. Yitzhak Kadmon.

Most of the report consists of slogans that are empty. They
spoke about education and its importance but did nothing to
extend the mandatory education law beyond 10th grade, they
did not legally fix the minimum hours of study every student
has a right to receive based on his age. Grandiose statements
about education from the age of three? In practice they did
not regulate education for young students from a standpoint
of licensing, supervision, enforcement and setting standards.
The Dovrat Report almost entirely failed to address the
number of children per class. The Council suggests a maximum
of 25 students per class.

"The Dovrat Report has good and bad things and perhaps our
strongest criticism is not on what the report contains but
what it lacks. The report is very eloquent but the committee
did not have the sense to carry through by making truly
binding recommendations. The report has almost no reference
to substance, ethical questions; there is something cold and
detached about it."

The report stresses raising the level of instruction at
schools. Toward this end, numerous conclusions and
recommendations on training and salaries are included, but
sadly, "the report does not contain, even on a declarative
level, the need to evaluate the teacher's personality and
character."

Another example is the slogan, "Preventing students from
dropping out of school." The committee repeatedly addresses
the dropout problem with words but not actions. Says Kadmon,
"The Committee placed much emphasis in its recommendations on
the issue of raising achievement and excellence. Principals
must by gauged not only according to measurements of
achievement and excellence, but also according to their
success in preventing students from dropping out."

The Council for Child Welfare continues with a harsh attack
on the transition to a five-day week. "We were unconvinced,"
the Council told Yated Ne'eman. "We were unconvinced
that all the consequences of this dramatic change were taken
into account."

When switching to a five-day week first two conditions must
be met: finding alternative arrangements for children on
Friday mornings and ensuring that the physical conditions at
all schools make it possible for children to remain for an
extended time.

Wasserman has plenty of gripes regarding the hasty change and
sees in his mind's eye seven-year-olds falling asleep on the
desktops. "How can children stay at school until 4:00 p.m.?"
he asks. Where will they spend all this time? Has someone
prepared suitable infrastructures? Everyone is full from all
the talk about the hot lunch program, yet nobody is attending
to the task of providing the conditions needed to feed the
children. Where will the students eat? At their desks? What
about air conditioning? Places to keep the backpacks? And
1,001 details involved in transforming the school to a home
away from home?

On Friday, students will stay home. Here the enormous social
gaps emerging in Israel society will come into play. "Broad
statements on programs for children on Fridays are not
enough," says the Council for Child Welfare. "The solution
must be free of charge, flexible, readily available, clear
and anchored in actual commitments."

What will happen in practice?

Wealthy parents from Ramat Aviv Gimmel will start a private
school for Fridays, will pay good money for it and will
receive enrichment studies —science, art and intensive
activities —for their children. What about parents from
Sderot and South Tel Aviv, who are really the majority of
parents in the country and who cannot afford such programs?
They will sit at work thinking about their children roaming
the streets. It should be kept in mind that approximately 40
percent of working parents work on Fridays, too. How many of
them will be able to stay home to keep an eye on a bored
child?

Teachers associations are irate over the schedule change. The
majority of teachers are women, stresses Wasserman, and a
woman teacher who comes home at 4:00 will be unable to
advance professionally. "She will come home and, like every
mother, will have to take care of her children and her home,
leaving her no time for advanced training and preparing for
school. I am concerned this could lead to large-scale flight
from the profession."

Teacher training will be more involved. Teachers will have to
study for four years and then work as a classroom aide before
taking a test to receive a teaching license.

Meanwhile, changes in compensation arrangements will spell
the end to the "morah em" bonus, which provides a pay
increase of 10 percent for teachers with a child under the
age of 18, and a bitter end to compensation for advanced
coursework ("gmul hishtalmut"). How will teachers' pay
be determined? Teachers will be ranked alef,
beit, etc., with seniority as the primary component.
There will be tenure but every five years the teacher will
get promoted in rank. Every promotion will require approval
by the principal, who will be able to decide on an individual
basis whether the teacher is worthy of a raise.

Dr. Mark, the Tel Aviv expert, sees the empowerment of the
principal as a grave development.

"The principal will turn into a little dictator," warns
Wasserman, the union official. "He will be able to decide a
teacher's pay and worse than that, he will be able to toss
him out of the system."

How? Remember, the principal has the school budget under his
control. The Dovrat Committee sees him as an all-powerful
entity, the perfect combination of economic wizard and
pedagogical authority. The principal will decide that the
aging teacher is costing the school too much and will opt to
hire two younger teachers instead. He will set the curriculum
and will decide if Teacher X fails to instill positive values
and belongs somewhere else.

The principals' stature emphasizes, more than anything else,
the commercial perspective guiding the Dovrat Committee. This
is not the way to build education, says Dr. Mark. The school
will be transformed into a frightening battlefield where
every teacher will fight for his place and to gain the
principal's favor in order to secure a promotion. Flattery
will reign and teachers will turn into their colleague's
enemies. "The ABC's of education are based on cooperation,"
emphasizes Dr. Mark. "Teachers have to work together to help
the student, to build a work program for him. A rival teacher
fighting for his position who thinks his colleague is liable
to steal his place will not cooperate."

Rivalry and competitiveness are important in building a
successful business. They lead to profits for commercial
enterprises, but cause tremendous losses in the field of
education. A school does not operate like a business, for a
school is not a company and teachers are not supposed to
compete for their pay, treading over values and using
students as evidence of their success.

"In general, why should children be tested all the time?"
asks Dr. Mark. "Why is there a need for an enormous exam in
2nd grade, for school assessment and a body to gauge
achievement? Through this businesslike approach the child
turns into a machine for output, for the raw material of the
education industry. Where is the education? Where is the
child? Where is his mental state and stability? Where is the
happiness, curiosity and creativity? Where is the pleasure in
learning?"

A Conspiracy Against Children?

Where does this business plan come from? Dr. Mark offers a
chilling thesis. "I hope this is merely speculation and not a
grounded theory. I hope it proves to be wrong."

Admittedly her hypothesis does sound a bit conspiratorial but
the logic and foundation for it are hard to ignore.

"Dovrat is demanding NIS 11 billion to implement the report,"
explains Dr. Mark. "In practice, the Education Ministry
budgeted it at only NIS 1.7 billion. The enormous gaps in the
budgeting are more than a bit strange and raised serious
suspicions in my eyes. In my opinion and to my trepidation
nobody really intends to implement this reform. The
intentions are perhaps entirely different and are not found
in the educational arena, but in the political, ideological
and social arena."

The idea, claims Dr. Mark, comes from Netanyahu, the big
proponent of neo-liberalism, and from faithful Finance
Ministry officials. Netanyahu and his Finance Ministry
staffers never intended to implement the Dovrat Report, she
says. Rather the reform is a tool for them in their attempts
to adapt American models to the system in Israel. Keep in
mind that the social solidarity in the State of Israel has
long since unraveled and every day new holes gape open in the
social safety net.

The proponents of neo-liberalism have two primary objectives.
The first is to gradually free the state from having to fund
education, just as it freed itself from the public health
care system. The health system is collapsing. The Association
for the War Against Cancer is calling on patients not to
receive radiation treatments using aging equipment,
medication is becoming more expensive and many sick people
cannot afford to buy the drugs they need.

The decentralization of educational authority and its
transfer from the Education Ministry to the local authorities
will free the State from its responsibility for education.
Netanyahu, Dr. Mark claims, wants to eliminate public
education, which will quickly bring us to a situation in
which parents who can afford it register their child for a
private kindergarten as soon as the child is born and pay
enormous sums to keep him in school. Within a few years this
will create one form of education for the rich and another
for the poor.

The second objective is to weaken the unions—the
Teachers' Union is large and strong—and fragment the
Histadrut and the minimal protection they provide workers.
"The State of Israel has transformed into a state of evil for
the workers. It seeks every possible way to neutralize the
workers' power and to turn them into slaves."

This reform, warns Dr. Mark, has been tried in many places
around the world and failed dismally. Why do we, she asks
regretfully, adopt theories that have been proven failures in
other countries and attempt to revive them ten years after
their demise?

"If the Dovrat Report is implemented in full," warns
Wasserman, "a commission of inquiry will be set up a few
years from now to investigate the colossal failures of the
education system and the reasons for these failures. An
education system that marches along the Dovrat path marches
to perdition."

The businessmen on the Dovrat Committee erred in their
central conclusion. Failures in business translate into
monetary losses that lead to drawing conclusions, making
heads roll and adopting a new direction. Failures in
education translate into violence, a lack of values, poor
achievement and a high dropout rate that lead to a committee
that draws conclusions that will hopefully be left to wither
and die on the shelf, otherwise they will be adopted in the
heat of the debate.

"The Dovrat Report will be Implemented"

"The Dovrat Report will be implemented," said Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon at the ceremony accompanying the presentation of
the Dovrat Report to the government. "There is a need for a
fundamental revitalization of the education system, although
the education system in its existing form has not failed. I
see graduates from the [school] system at the vanguard of the
war on terror and in the upper ranks of industry. We want the
reform to pass with as large a majority as possible. I call
on the Minister of Education, the teachers' organizations and
the local authorities to sit down together. Our intention is
to thoroughly attend to the status of the teacher."

At the ceremony, Education Minister L. Livnat said, "The
report will effect reform not only in the education system
but in the entire civic perspective." Education Ministry
Director-General R. Tirosh said the ministry has set up a
team headed by Dovrat Committee Coordinator Shmulik Har-Noy
in order to start implementing the committee's conclusions
already at the beginning of the coming year, in order to
reach "a point of no return."

Based on the recent coalition agreement between UTJ and the
Likud, the chareidi educational system will not be required
to implement the recommendations.

According to government estimates 9,000-14,000 teachers will
be dismissed, but Dovrat says this number need not cause
alarm since it includes some 6,000 teachers who drop out of
the teaching profession every year and others who will be
given incentives to leave the profession. Teachers'
organizations contend that up to 30,000 teachers could lose
their jobs.

The Dovrat Report recommends raising entry-level salaries
from the current NIS 3,300 ($750) to NIS 5,500 ($1,250), but
meanwhile their hours will be increased from 25 to 40 hours
per week. Tenured teachers will earn a maximum of NIS 8,250
($1,900).

According to Ron Erez, chairman of the Organization of Upper-
School Teachers, "In effect teachers' per-hour pay will
decrease rather than increase and veteran teachers will not
be rewarded according to their worth. The rise in entry-level
pay will create a bait to attract people to teaching and to
trap them in the system."

But Shmuel Dovrat insists that teachers will be getting paid
for the work they now do at home. "All we are saying is that
a teacher, during the hours he is not in class and with the
provision of suitable physical conditions, remain at the
school. This is how teachers work around the world. Nowhere
in the world does a teacher just teach in front of the class
and do the rest of his hours at home," says Dovrat.

Teachers' organizations sent the Prime Minister a letter
opposing the Dovrat Report and demanding a meeting. A joint
statement issued by the Teachers' Union and the Organization
of Upper School-Teachers read, "Based on familiarity with the
report and analysis, and familiarity with the education
system, the Dovrat Committee recommendations mean over 20,000
teachers will be dismissed in the next five years. These
figures were confirmed by ranking Finance Ministry officials
such as Yuval Rachlevsky. The teachers who remain will have
to work harder in more crowded classrooms."